On Doctoring

0:00

0:00

Description

As a painter and a physician, the worlds of medicine and art are inseparable. Painting allows me the chance to explore the unanswerable questions encountered in medicine. These questions on the human condition, suffering, healing, hope, life, death and our responsibility to each other have been raw material for my recent work. On one’s journey to become a doctor, one comes face to face with what it means to be human at the deepest level. It has been an incredible journey from my first days in the anatomy lab with its reminders of our fragility and mortality through my encounters in pediatric clinic with children whose lives have only just begun. Painting has also awakened my senses to a new and valuable dimension to doctoring. In a time when the study and practice of medicine has become more impersonal, more defensive and more of a business, art has helped me reconnect with my reasons for entering the field of medicine. I find particular joy in reviving and mending unfinished pieces. I enjoy the challenge of uniting seemingly incompatible parts to form a harmonious whole. My most recent work has combined paint with obscure materials like gauze, paper, textiles and x-ray film.